The H.O.M.E.T.E.A.M and HARRY JONES

by Vlad Pogorelov and Harry Jones, PoorNewsNetwork

Harry Jones lies in his old, rugged sleeping bag on the concrete hill under the 280 freeway. It’s been raining for the last two weeks and though he’s tried to keep warm and dry by wrapping himself in newspapers under his clothes, after so many days of rain, it’s been of little help. Harry has been shivering for the last two days. He was feverish and was thinking of going to the emergency room at San Francisco General Hospital but is too infirm to walk. There is a big puddle of water next to him and rusty water from the leaky ceiling is dripping on Harry’s sleeping bag, but he is too weak to seek other shelter.

In addition to this sickness the longtime health problem of his injured back has been exacerbated. It has been hurting so much that even at night he has not been able sleep. He remembered how he recuperated from his back injury which he received while working at the warehouse in San Francisco Port. Back then, a physician who recommended him for disability told him, “Harry, remember if you don’t want your back to get worse, don’t do any heavy lifting or expose yourself to cold or humidity.” That was ten years ago.

Recently, at the age of 53, Harry was evicted from his apartment in the gentrified Mission District of San Francisco. Unable to find a place that he could afford on his S.S.I. income, he is resigned to living on the street. He has been living on the street for the last 9 months and his situation has been getting progressively worse. At first he tried collecting recyclables to supplement his income, but his injured back worsened and soon prevented him from doing this.

Harry tried sleeping on community park benches, but was cited by the local police on numerous occasions for 647(j)PC (illegal lodging).
Unable to continue sleeping on benches, he decided to seek cover under the bridges and freeways. There, he found a large number of homeless people as well as comradery. During the last month Harry found shelter underneath the 101 freeway. There were about fifty homeless people who were there with him. Harry had his little corner space separated from others by cardboard boxes. In his 4’x6’ “flat”, he kept all of his possessions—a cooking pot, a mattress, two blankets, a propane lantern, the Bible and a novel by Upton Sinclair, “The Jungle”. After a few weeks of living there, Harry started to relax. Even his back wasn’t hurting as much as it had been. When it did hurt, Harry was able to go to San Francisco General’s emergency room, since it was nearby. It was the rest that he needed so much.

But suddenly Harry’s relative peace of mind came to an abrupt end. One night a dozen police cars surrounded Harry and his homeless neighbors. One of the policemen in charge introduced himself as Sargeant Steve Balma—a notorious founder of H.O.M.E.T.E.A.M., which is responsible for citing, arresting and displacing homeless residents of San Francisco. Everyone was given a citation for illegal lodging. All of their carts and belongings were confiscated and a number of people were arrested and booked in county jail. Harry went to the local shelters but there was no slace for him. After a few days of sleeping on the sidewalk his health problems became severe.

A child of Sargeant Steve Balma and Captain Sylvia Harper of Southern Police Station, H.O.M.E.T.E.A.M. was created in May, 2000. The acronym H.O.M.E.T.E.A.M. stands for “Helping Offenders Maintain the Environment Thorough Enforcement, Accountability, and Management”. According to a memorandum of the San Francisco Police Department, the objective of this unit was to address “quality of life complaints involving people sleeping in doorways, encampments, and peddlers obstructing sidewalks, public drunkenness, drug activity, human waste and needles often left by quality of life code violators”. An excuse for creating this special unit was that “complaints received by members of Southern Station regarding quality of life issues has increased to intolerable proportions”, as was stated by Sergeant Steve Balma in his letter to Commanding Officer of Southern Police Station, Captain Sylvia Harper.

The officers assigned to H.O.M.E.T.E.A.M. are paid overtime for performing this work. According to an SFPD internal memorandum “hours of overtime per day of operation would be 8 hours at sergeant’s pay and 24 hours at patrol officer’s pay.

The H.O.M.E.T.E.A.M. concentrates on such areas as Stevenson, Jessie, and Minna Streets, between 4th and 8th Streets, Market Street at Jones Street, 7th Street, Duboce Street and Valencia Street. It also patrols Brannan Street between 8th and 10th, Beale Street between Howard and Bryant and areas adjacent to freeway on-ramps, off-ramps and overpasses.

Though created with an understanding that “this program was not designed to criminalize homelessness”, the statistics of H.O.M.E. T.E.A.M. convey just the opposite. During their first 15 days of operation they cleared 300 encampments, issued 44 citations and booked 10 individuals in jail. As they stepped up their campaign against homeless individuals, the officers of this notorious unit cited 391 individuals and booked 47 people in jail, as of February 2nd, 2001. The number of admonishments for 647(j) PC (illegal lodging) was 781. Their statistics also state that several subjects have been cited more than once on the same charge, 647(j)PC (illegal lodging), with many of them receiving two citations per week.

The median cost of operating this unit by paying officers overtime is over $7,000 per month. The team only operated 2 times per week for a period of 4 hours. It has cost taxpayers over $70,000 since the campaign of harassment of San Francisco homeless residents of San Francisco by Southern Station began. In the meantime, dozens of homeless have died due to exposure to the elements, lack of shelter space, hunger and insufficient health care.

On one rainy night, feeling very sick, Harry crawled through the hole in the fence surrounding the space underneath 280 freeway. He has been there for the last five days. There has been no one to help him. He has had no food or water, nor has he had any medications for his fever or back pain. At times, Harry has been loosing his consciousness, becoming delirious because of his high fever. He has been coughing and has had difficulties breathing most of the time. “If only I could get up on my feet, then I would walk to the hospital and ask for help,” he whispered through his cracked lips. At times, when he can think clearly, Harry has been thinking of death. He has tried to chase the thoughts about this subject away but his condition has only reminded him of how bad his health is.

Harry has been hoping that it would stop raining and after his clothes and sleeping bag dried he might be able to get up on his feet and seek help. While having this thought and staring at the rusty, leaky concrete above him Harry, heard two male voices talking to each other and a police radio, “I’ve had a complaint from our source in the neighborhood about criminal activity underneath the freeway. I am going to look for a suspect and you stay here and back me up.” In a few seconds a cop, who was a member of the H.O.M.E.T.E.A.M., was flashing a light into Harry’s face. Harry was ordered to get up and was searched, but nothing illegal was found on him. He was cited for illegal lodging. Harry tried to explain that he had nowhere to go but police threatened to arrest him if he didn’t leave. Harry was so weak that he had difficulties speaking for himself. The tears were running down his bearded face, but the policemen were merciless.

Harry crawled back out into the rain. Going to the emergency room was out of the question, since he could barely move. He remembered that there was a homeless shelter a few blocks away, although the last time he’d tried to check in it was full. But Harry knew that if he didn’t find a place inside he would not survive this night. The rain was starting to resemble Niagra Falls. Harry fell into the mud a few times on his way to a shelter. Somewhere along the way he lost his sleeping bag and his wallet. It took him 2 hours under the pouring rain to reach a homeless shelter.

Harry is only one example of thousands of homeless residents in this city who have suffered at the hands of H.O.M.E.T.E.A.M. officers. In the second part of this report I will continue the story of Harry Jones—a 53 year-old former laborer with disabilities. In the meantime, there are thousands of homeless folks who struggle to survive on the streets, being criminalized by SFPD and the City. It is our civic and humanitarian duty to say “No” to the squandering of taxpayers’ money through supporting the operations of an inhuman unit H.O.M.E.T.E.A.M.. We should act fast, because for many homeless residents it may be too late.

Harry Jones was a staff writer through POOR Magazine’s writer facilitation program which aims to give voice to the insider expertise of low/no income Bay Area residents about issues of race and class oppression. Before his untimely death on the streets of San Francisco, Harry collaborated with POOR Magazine staff to create this story.